Hilaire Belloc - The Collected Works of Hilaire Belloc

Upon the 2nd of July, in the early morning, Marlborough, by one of those rapid movements which were a prime element in his continuous success, marched before dawn with something between seven and eight thousand infantry carefully chosen for the task and thirty-five squadrons of horse for the attack on the Schellenberg. It was Marlborough’s alternate day of command.

With all his despatch, he could not arrive on the height of the hill nor attack its imperfect but rapidly completing works until the late afternoon. It is characteristic of his generalship that he risked an assault with this advance body of his without waiting for the main part of the army under the Duke of Baden to come up. With sixteen battalions only, of whom a third were British, he attempted to carry works behind which a force equal to his own in strength was posted. The risk was high, for he could hardly hope to carry the works with such a force, and all depended upon the main body coming up in time. There was but an hour or two of daylight left.

The check which Marlborough necessarily received in such an attempt incidentally gave proof of the excellent material of his troops. More than a third of these fell in the first furious and undecided hour. They failed to carry the works. They had already once begun to break and once again rallied, but had suffered no final dissolution under the ordeal—though it was both the first to which the men were subjected during this campaign, and probably also the most severe of any they were to endure.

Whether they, or indeed any other troops, could long have survived such conditions as an attempt to storm works against equal numbers is not open to proof; for, while the issue was still doubtful (but the advantage naturally with the force behind the trenches), the mass of the army under the Duke of Baden came up in good time upon the right (that is, from the side of the town), poured almost unopposed over the deserted earthworks of that side, and, five to one, overwhelmed the 12,000 Franco-Bavarians upon the hill.

After one of those short stubborn and futile attempts at resistance which such situations discover in all wars, the inevitable dissolution of d’Arco’s command came before the darkness. It was utterly routed; and we may justly presume that not 4000—more probably but 3000—rejoined the army of Marcin and of the Elector of Bavaria.

The loss of the Schellenberg had cost Marlborough’s enemies, whose forces were already gravely inferior to his own, eight guns and close upon one-fifth of their effective numbers. The Franco-Bavarians hurried south to entrench themselves under Augsburg, while Donauwörth, and with it the passage of the two great rivers and the entry into Bavaria, lay in the possession of Marlborough and his ally.

The balance of military and historical opinion will decide that Marlborough played for too high stakes in beginning the assault so late in the evening and with so small a force. But he was playing for speed, and he won the hazard.

It was a further reward of his daring that he could point after this first engagement to the fine quality of his British contingent. 6

It was upon the evening of July the 2nd, then, that this capital position was stormed. It was upon the 5th that Marcin and the Elector lay hopeless and immobile before Augsburg, while their enemies entered a now defenceless Bavaria by its north-western gate. And this complete achievement of Marlborough’s plan was but the end of the first phase in the campaign upon the Danube.

Meanwhile, a large French reinforcement under Tallard was already far up on its way from the Rhine, across the Black Forest, to join Marcin and the Elector of Bavaria and set back the tide of war, and, when it should have effected its junction with those who awaited it at Augsburg, to oppose to Marlborough and the Duke of Baden a total force greater than their own.

The French marshal, Tallard, was in command of the army thus rapidly approaching in relief of the Franco-Bavarians. His arrival, if he came without loss, disease, or mishap, promised a complete superiority over the English and their allies, unless, indeed, by some accident or stroke of genius, reinforcement should reach them also before the day of the battle.

This reinforcement, in the event, Marlborough did receive. He owed it, as we shall see, to the high talents of Prince Eugene; and it is upon the successful march of this general, his junction with Marlborough, and the consequent success of Blenheim, that the rest of the campaign turns.

We turn next, then, to follow the second phase of the seven weeks, which consists in Tallard’s advance to join the Elector, and in Eugene’s rapid parallel march, which brought him, just in time, to Marlborough’s aid.

The Advance of Tallard

To follow the second phase of the seven weeks, that is, the phase subsequent to the capture of the Schellenberg and the retirement of Marcin and the Elector of Bavaria on to Augsburg, it is necessary to hark back a little, and to trace from its origin that advance of Tallard’s reinforcements which was to find on the field of Blenheim so disastrous a termination.

We shall see that in this second phase Tallard did indeed manage to effect his junction with the Elector and Marcin with singular despatch; that this junction compelled Marlborough and Baden to cease the ravaging of Bavaria upon which they had been engaged, and to join in closely watching the movement of the Franco-Bavarian forces, lest their own retreat or their line of supplies should be cut off by that now large army.

The Schellenberg was stormed, as we have seen, on the 2nd of July.

Tallard, as we have also seen, had orders from Versailles, when Marlborough’s plan of reaching the Danube was clear, to put himself in motion for an advance to the Elector’s aid.

He moved at first with firmness and deliberation, determined to secure every post of his advance throughout the difficult hills, and thoroughly to provision his route. He crossed the Rhine upon July 1st, and during the very hours that, far to the east, the disaster of Donauwörth was in progress, he was assembling his forces upon the right bank of the river before beginning to secure his passage through the Black Forest. Upon the 4th he began his march over the hills.

A week later he was in the heart of the broken country at Hornberg, and on the 16th of July he had contained the garrison of Villingen, the principal stronghold which barred his route to the Danube, and which, did he leave it untaken, would jeopardise his provision and supply, the health and even the maintenance of his horses and men by the mountain road.

Upon the 18th he opened fire upon the town; but on the very day that the siege thus began he received from Marcin the whole story of the disaster of the Schellenberg, which had taken place a fortnight before, and a most urgent request for immediate reinforcement.

Tallard’s deliberation, his attempt to secure the enemy’s one stronghold upon the line of his passage across the hills, and amply to provision his advance, were fully justified. He knew nothing of the fall of Donauwörth. He believed himself to have full time for a properly organised march to join the Elector of Bavaria, and that meant the capture of Villingen. And the siege of that fortress had the further advantage that it compelled Eugene and his army to remain near the Rhine. Only at this late day, the 18th of July, did Tallard learn that the forces of Marlborough and of Baden had captured the crossing of the Danube and the Lech, and were pouring into Bavaria.

He should have known it earlier, but the despatch which bore him the information had miscarried.

Already, upon the 9th, Marcin had written from Augsburg a pressing letter to Tallard, bidding him neglect everything save an immediate march, and, ill provisioned as he was, and insecure as he would leave his communications, to hasten to the aid of the Elector. Marlborough and Baden (he wrote) had crossed the Danube and the Lech on the 5th and 6th of July. They were before Rhain; and when Rhain fell (as fall it must), all Bavaria would be at their mercy.